


Stirring Portraits

by wirewool



Category: Original Work
Genre: Bondage, M/M, Orgasm Delay/Denial, Other, Vibrators, weird ass stuff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-03
Updated: 2016-01-03
Packaged: 2018-05-11 06:59:44
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,861
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5617615
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wirewool/pseuds/wirewool
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for the "Stirring Portrait" Dec 23rd Auideas Advent Calendar prompt (http://auideas.tumblr.com/post/135538302547/aac-december-19th), but I was too late to submit it in time and it got too long anyway.</p><p>The original prompt was:<br/>Character A is an artist who primarily paints detailed portraits of people, but every single one of them is crying – not in an adorable or artistically traditional way, but in the most realistic and heartbreaking way. They practically eat, sleep, and breathe the complexity of human consciousness, so when they meet Character B, an emotionally cold individual, Character A wants nothing more than to capture the true essence of Character B in one of their famous ‘crying portraits.’</p><p>There is also a bonus epilogue.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Stirring Portraits

"They are so heart-breaking, so touching," the visitor emphasized, still not letting go of Nenad's hand. He tried to maintain a pleasant smile while they went on, hoping it didn't look as strained as it felt. If it did, it still did absolutely nothing to deter the other, who went on and on in their analysis of his works. It amazed Nenad how completely wrong someone could perceive the things he drew. They weren't even barking up the wrong tree, they weren't even barking up a tree at all. Although there certainly were stories behind the drawings, the stories belonged to the subjects, and not to Nenad and some kind of "tragic past" of his. All Nenad did was capture people on paper when their walls crumbled and they let their grief explode freely into the world. He found stuff like that thrilling — sure, he loved outbursts of joy or anger as well, but nothing was quite as thrilling as seeing someone cry.

But of course, that wasn't something he was about to say. They would only think him perverse.

Though, then again, maybe that would make this person shut up and stop trying to make Nenad into some kind of tragic genius figure. It hadn't even been Nenad's idea to exhibit his works to begin with anyway, so what did he care what people thought of them or himself? He had needed the money, though, and he'd already been offered some ridiculous sums of money for some of the drawings. If he just kept smiling and humming for a while more he could live relatively comfortably for a while more while he kept looking for a new job. Fortunately the talker suddenly realised that they were late for some kind of prior arrangement, and hurriedly said good-bye, finally letting go of Nenad's hand. He sighed with relief, and headed towards the bathroom. He badly needed some space to breathe, or he'd be the one crying.

Apparently someone else had felt the same way, because a smartly clad man with a distinctly non-smiling face framed by dark hair sat in the spot along the wall that Nenad had been using for his own time-outs during the time the exhibition had been taking place. Not bothered in the slightest, Nenad plopped down next to him. The man's face in profile was rather striking, and appealed to Nenad's aesthetics strongly. He bet the man would look amazing crying, but he had trouble picturing what that would look like — which only made him even more intrigued. He rarely had trouble at least giving people an imaginary expression of grief. This always troubled him slightly — how did you invite someone over for a portrait drawing session where you'd want to try to make people sad? Needless to say, most people weren't too keen on following a strange guy who promised to make them cry. Well, Nenad mused, it couldn't hurt to try to ask. The worst that could happen would be that the man said no.

"Not a fan of crowds?" Nenad ventured, attempting to strike up conversation. The man looked up, straightening his back and folding his hands neatly in his lap before replying.

"I don't particularly mind crowds," the man countered, "But I find the way that people smile and shower praise over such twisted drawings distasteful." He drew a deep breath. "I can't leave before my collegue is satisfied, though. He's the one with the car."

"Twisted, huh..." Nenad couldn't help but smile a wry smile. For some reason that assessment of his works made him happier than anything he'd heard all week. "I suppose you wouldn't be feeling up to modeling for one of those drawings, then."

"Modeling?" The man fell silent for a moment, no doubt to realise that Nenad was the artist and that he'd just given him some scathing critique. "Do you mean to say that you'd attempt to make me cry?"

"Well, it's not everything that I draw... But ideally, yes," he admitted. The man fell silent for a while again. It was really quite exciting how Nenad couldn't read his face at all, but the fact that the man hadn't said no straight away gave him a bit of hope that he might accept.

"I can't promise that I can cry," the man said slowly, "But if you'd want to draw me, I guess I don't really have any reason to object."

Nenad grinned and jotted down his address on a business card.

 

"Welcome to my humble abode," Nenad said as he unlocked the door to his apartment and showed Munroe — as he'd learned the man was called — in, kicking his shoes off in the tiny outcrop that represented a hallway. "I don't have much, but mi casa es su casa."

Munroe followed suit and took off his own shoes, albeit in a more proper manner. His shoes were in a much better condition than Nenad's as well, as was painfully obvious when they were all lined up next to each other. If they'd been cars, Munroe's shoes would have been a limosine that had reluctantly parked next to an old pile of junk that had seen at least three generations' worth of owners pass through and yet somehow miraculously kept going.

The apartment had one room with a cooking corner and a door that Munroe assumed led to a bathroom. The room had a bed that had been made in a hurry, a set of drawers and a coffee table that was buried in those of Nenad's belongings that hadn't been graciously swept into a pile by the foot of the bed, notably droves of papers with half-finished drawings of mainly crying people. For a moment, Munroe wondered if he'd maybe walked into a tv show and ended up getting lured by a serial killer, but a glance at the cooking corner told him it was highly unlikely that Nenad owned even a kitchen knife sharp enough to do much damage, and judging by his size, Munroe should be able to take him down easily if he turned out to be any kind of suspicious.

Not that he had any right to be pointing fingers, though, it wasn't like his own motives to come see Nenad were entirely pure either — not that he was out for murder, he was absolutely not and he had never intentionally severely hurt someone in his entire life, but he wouldn't have bothered come if he hadn't found Nenad attractive. There was something very sharp about him that appealed to Munroe, in both his appearance and way of acting.

Not to mention that his ass looked quite good, he noticed as Nenad bent down to see if he had anything in the fridge worthy of offering a guest. After a complicated series of frowns and mutterings Nenad finally pulled out a couple of beers.

"I'd offer something nicer," he said apologetically, "but if you don't want a beer all I have is water?"

"Beer's fine," Munroe shrugged, accepting the offered can and sitting down on the bed. Normally he wouldn't have any alcohol this early in the day, but if he was going to try to make any sort of move later on he might well need some liquid courage. After all, he didn't even know what Nenad's preferences were.

He let his eyes wander around the room for a bit while Nenad gathered together a bunch of scrap papers to start sketching on.

"You don't have an atelier?" Munroe asked.

"Does it look like I could afford one?" Nenad snorted.

"Sorry."

"Nah, it's cool. I'm not an artist in the first hand anyway," Nenad shrugged, "I'm hoping to get some kind of job related to psychology or sociology research soon, art has just been a way for me to kill time. I didn't even want to do the exhibition in the first place, but I needed the money." A paper dropped to the floor. On it Munroe could see himself, roughly penned down multiple times. He hadn't imagined that Nenad would have had the time to draw him that many times already in that brief time period, it was kind of amazing. Granted, it was very rough sketches, and the ones that Munroe guessed were the first ones only really resembled himself if you knew it was him, but already by the other edge of the paper you could already start to tell that it was him. As Nenad kept talking about first his situation, and then went off on barely related tangents more papers kept dropping. The ones that only portrayed his face as it was turned better and better until they were undisputably him, but the ones where Nenad attributed other expressions to him — sadness, happiness, disgust, sadness, fear, grief, sadness... — all looked very unnatural. Munroe made no comment on it, as he could tell that Nenad already knew this. His frown grew more and more severe, but at the same time he didn't seem angry, just intensely concentrated. If anything, the difficulty in making the fictional Munroe display vivid emotions only seemed to spur him on more. At times he'd make frustrated grunting noises that Munroe kind of liked, and he wondered what kind of noises he'd make under Munroe's hand.

Lost in his thoughts, Munroe almost jumped when Nenad suddenly addressed him once again.

"Do you mind if I touch you a bit?"

Nenad had gotten up off the floor and settled down cross-legged facing Munroe next to him on the bed, staring intently at his face. For a moment Munroe wasn't sure if Nenad had actually said those words or if his mind, already in the gutter, had chosen to hear something else instead of what Nenad had really said, but then he realised that the words could definitely be interpreted non-sexually as well. Either way, he did not mind.

"Go ahead."

Nenad's fingertips were cool against his face, gently guiding him to turn his head in different directions as Nenad studied his face intently. Occasionally a finger would stroke along a facial feature as he studied it; Munroe couldn't tell if it was intentional or a subconscious action on Nenad's part. He enjoyed the feeling though, and was disappointed when Nenad let go again to keep sketching with renewed resolve.

This was definitely one of the strangest encounters he'd ever made.

 

He could capture Munroe's likeness fairly easily now, but apart from some minor shifts in eyebrow angle he hadn't really made anything worthy of being called an expression, so Nenad's efforts towards a realistic crying portrait hadn't really advanced in any meaningful way. He chewed on his pen in frustration while erasing a bunch of bad lines.

"Do you mind if I touch you a bit?"

On the one hand, Nenad figured it'd make sense if Munroe's intentions had been less than pure in accepting his invitation — after all, the invitation had in itself been weird. But on the other hand, Munroe's expression was stony as ever and betrayed no attraction whatsoever, so Nenad wasn't sure he'd heard him correctly.

"Pardon?" he asked politely, though the effect was greatly reduced by the smirk he couldn't quite fight off his face. He wasn't going to lie, the idea that he'd managed to seduce the other man, despite all the weirdness surrounding him, was quite flattering.

Munroe repeated himself, with maybe just a hint of nervousness. Nenad dropped his things over the edge of the bed and settled himself into a slightly more comfortable sitting position, beckoning Munroe closer. Munroe, too, started with gently touching Nenad's face, although with more of the hand than just the fingertips. It'd be nice to be held down by these hands, Nenad mused, though he left the thought at that. That wasn't part of the current plan. Still, he leaned into Munroe's touch as the other man grew bolder and let his hands wander down Nenad's spine. He'd let him have some fun before they got down to business.

 

Munroe wasn't used to having partners who conveyed their enjoyment quite so obviously and shamelessly, and it slowed him down a bit in his exploration of Nenad's body. Nenad didn't object to anything he did, even when Munroe pulled Nenad into his lap into a tight embrace, weaving one hand into his hair while the other travelled down his ass. Instead, Nenad hummed in approval, allowing Munroe to do anything he pleased for a while, until he started going for the clothes.

"Hang on," Nenad said, and Munroe eased his grip on him a bit, worried that he'd done something to put Nenad off. Nenad gently pushed Munroe down onto his back. Puzzled, Munroe closed his eyes as Nenad's t-shirt fell onto his face as Nenad scooted up to reach for something on the floor at the head of the bed. Munroe heard rattling of pens rolling as rustling of papers being shoved aside, as well as something that sounded suspiciously like a previously hidden stash of empty cans toppling over. Munroe didn't pay more attention than that though, as he breathed in Nenad's scent through the t-shirt, glad that Nenad was straddling his chest and not his crotch area. It was a bit embarrassing that he was already pretty hard.

"Alright," he heard Nenad say before the t-shirt left his face, giving him free view of Nenad smiling down at him. "Put your arms up above your head," he continued, freeing Munroe's own, long-sleeved t-shirt from the hem of his pants. Munroe obeyed. Maybe Nenad was just self-conscious about being the first one naked? Or naked at all. Didn't really matter to Munroe. As the shirt was halfway off, bunched up around Munroe's head and once again obscuring his vision, Nenad suddenly let go, pinned Munroe's arms above his head Munroe heard two quick series of clicks and felt something around his wrists. Instinctively, Munroe tried to sit up and pull the shirt away from his head, but quickly found that he couldn't move his arms away.

"Sorry that I tricked you," Nenad said, pulling Munroe's shirt back down so he could see the apologetic smile on Nenad's face. "But I wasn't sure you'd agree to being tied up, and I did say I'd try to make you cry. If it feels like it starts to be too much, just say — uh, pineapple." Nenad gently stroked a finger over the bulge in Munroe's pants to emphasise "too much".

Munroe's first instinct was to try to fight his way out, and outrage over having been tricked, but he was already in quite a state, and he didn't really want to leave like this. He had agreed to let Nenad try to make him cry, as well; without bothering to figure out what that even meant, to boot. If it involved him being tied up — or shackled, really, it seemed — while Nenad touched him, he supposed that wasn't too bad of a deal. Besides, he'd even been given a safe word. He could just lie back for a while and see how this would develop, at least. He took a deep breath, and then nodded.

"Fine."

"Would you be okay with me tying up your legs as well?"

Munroe nodded again. Might as well, he supposed.

"Excellent!"

Nenad gave him a grin before sliding off the bed to go find more handcuffs to attach each of Munroe's legs to a bedpost. Nenad nodded to himself, pleased with his work, before getting back on the bed in between Munroe's legs, pulling down his zipper and underwear.

"There's just ooooooone more thing before we can get going," Nenad almost sang, grinning down at Munroe, who got a sinking feeling in his stomach. What more could there possibly be? Nenad fished up a ring-shaped object from his pocket and fastened it around the base of Munroe's dick before he even had the time to object. Munroe's complaint got cut off by a moan as Nenad's hands wrapped around his dick tightly.

He hated how much Nenad's smirk turned him on at that point.

 

Teasing Munroe was fun, and he could easily have just fucked him until he himself came and then allowed Munroe some release once he'd finished. That would have been enjoyable in itself at this point, but Nenad did have a mission, and although Munroe had started making some wonderfully unrestrained expressions by now, there still hadn't been any tears.

Of course, he wouldn't necessarily have had to try to achieve tears through sex, and that was in fact not how he usually went about it at all. Most often he'd stumble upon people who were already crying because of pain or sadness as he went around town, and occasionally he'd lend them a shoulder to cry on just to get the opportunity to study them closer. Sometimes he'd make people cry with insensitive remarks, even. On some odd occasions he'd come across people who wanted him to abuse them physically, and them he hurt until they cried, and as payment he'd have them let him draw them, but them and other masochists weren't generally really what he was looking for, as they derived pleasure from what he did to them, which wasn't exactly what he was looking for.

However, for Munroe, he'd deduced that that was the most plausible way to get him to cry at all, since he was so naturally expressionless that he doubted that showing him sad videos or telling sad tales was unlikely to get him emotional enough unless Nenad happened to stumble across something that really made him very, very affected. Pain was probably also a no-go, since he had a feeling that he'd have to get to some pretty heavy-duty stuff to wring out tears, and he didn't much fancy having to borderline murder someone for his art. He did have boundraries for how far he'd go for his art — they might well be a bit blurry, and he might well be moving it back and forth a bit depending on the situation, but they were still there.

Hence, sex. He had had some moral doubts about it, but fortunately Munroe didn't seem to be too unhappy about the situation, judging by the way his body was reacting, and the sounds he made. He hoped the treatment he was receiving wouldn't bother him too much, Nenad could well imagine future encounters of a more recreational nature.

He kept stroking Munroe for a while, but only just enough for him to barely feel it. In vain, Munroe tried to press up against Nenad's hand to increase the pressure, fighting against the restraints, but Nenad simply moved a bit further away. Breathing heavily, Munroe blinked quickly, instinctively trying to keep his eyes from tearing up. Excited, Nenad increased pressure just a bit, surprising Munroe, who let out a small gasp at the unexpected motion.

"Yes, yes, that's excellent!" Nenad cooed at him, and Munroe flushed at the strange praise, but didn't have the presence of mind to make any objections. They were getting there, but now the problem was that if Nenad stopped touching Munroe he'd be able to calm down and stop crying while Nenad tried to get the scene down on paper.

Oh! I'm so dumb, Nenad thought. Munroe let out a whine as he let go and went to dig into one of his piles of stuff, but he quickly returned with a vibrator. He held it up for Munroe to see.

"Would this be okay?" Nenad asked, mostly for show, as he half expected Munroe to not reply.

"Yeah, whatever," Munroe managed to utter between breaths, and Nenad lubed it up before inserting it, on the highest level it could go. At first Munroe made an expression of relief as he finally got the stimulation he craved, but very soon he was writhing in frustration again as he was still prevented from coming, and soon tears started slowly falling.

"Peeeeerfect," Nenad purred, and started to quickly sketch while continuing to give Munroe gentle words of encouragement. Finally, now that he had a proper model with the proper expression he could finally get the expression that he wanted down well. He filled several pages with smaller sketches before he settled on one that he started turning into a proper portrait — although he'd have to hurry it up just a bit, he didn't want to completely wreck his poor subject completely.

 

When he was done with the drawing Nenad carefully approached Munroe again, removing the vibrator. Munroe fell back with a deep sigh, and Nenad gently wiped his face free from tears.

"Thank you for putting up with this without complaining," Nenad said sweetly, "I had expected you to use the safeword by now, but you held out much better than expected, I'm impressed! I'll uncuff you now, so please stay still for a moment," Nenad explained, moving to uncuff first Munroe's legs — taking a moment to massage his ankles a bit — and then leaning over him to uncuff his hands.

Nenad had taken Munroe's stillness for exhaustion, but he was sorely mistaken. As soon as his hands were free, Munroe reversed their positions, pinning Nenad down underneath him, quickly ridding himself of the ring around his dick.

"Would this be okay?" Munroe repeated in a mocking tone, almost a growl. Nenad, having had the wind knocked out of him, could only answer with a grin as Munroe kissed his neck hard as he got their pants and underwear out of the way enough for Munroe to enter him. Neither of them managed to particularly quiet as Munroe thrust into Nenad hard, ridding himself of all the pent-up frustration. Considering how long Nenad had kept Munroe tied up he lasted a surprisingly long time — long enough to annoy Nenad's neighbour, who started banging against the wall they shared. Even if Nenad hadn't been completely incapacitated by Munroe he wouldn't have wanted to stop in the slightest, so his only reaction was a couple of huffs of laughter in between gasps of breath.

Even if Munroe had been surprisingly enduring, it didn't take all that long for him to come, and Nenad didn't last all that much longer, and for a while they lay there, still — Munroe out of exhaustion, and Nenad mostly because Munroe was too heavy for him to go anywhere, really. If only he could go shower this would have been the best encounter he'd ever made.

...No, actually, it still was. A tired smile lingered on his face.

 

"Don't ever show these drawings to anyone," Munroe said, with a frown on his face, as he looked over Nenad's sketches on his way out.

"No risk," Nenad said, smile still on his lips. "I like these too much to share with anyone."

Munroe looked up at him, staring at him hard for a while before he handed the papers back to Nenad and opened his mouth.

"Could we do this again sometime?"

Nenad gestured vaguely to the room around him.

"You know where to find me."

 


	2. Stirring Footage

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bonus.

"Hey, Munroe!" Nenad sauntered into Munroe's office around lunch time one Thursday. Munroe looked up in surprise.

"How did you get in?" he asked, baffled. It wasn't that he wasn't happy to see Nenad, quite the opposite — but security in the building which housed the accounting company Munroe worked for was strict, and Nenad didn't have any sort of clearance there.

"Oh, Robert recognised me from the other times you signed me in," Nenad said casually, alluding to one of the security guards working in the reception. "I just told him I was here to see you again."

"That's—" Munroe started to protest, but stopped himself with a sigh. It was incredibly irresponsible of the guard to do that, but he supposed it wasn't Nenad's fault, so telling him off wouldn't solve anything. It would be bad if someone suspicious got ahold of the kind of information Munroe's company handled, but it was potentially catastrophic if they managed to infiltrate some of the other, more high profile companies in the buildings. He'd have to bring this up with the managers of the building. He didn't want to put Robert in trouble, though, since there hadn't really been any danger this time. "If someone asks, you don't remember which guard let you in, ok?" He told Nenad, who gave a one-sided shrug. Munroe would make a general complaint that made sure they got stricter with security but didn't punish anyone in particular. "What brings you here today?"

"Nothing in particular, I just wanted to see you, and unless I'm mistaken this is your lunch hour, right? Figured I'd alleviate some of your boredom," Nenad grinned.

"I wasn't particularly bored—" Nenad didn't seem to believe him. Munroe didn't understand why so many thought that math and accounting was boring, he found it very rewarding, if not fun. "—but I appreciate it nonetheless," he admitted. It was a slow day and the only other coworker that had been around that day had had a prior arrangement to go to lunch with someone else, so if Nenad hadn't come around Munroe would have been eating alone while working. Although he didn't mind, a change of pace was welcome.

"It sure is quiet around here today though," Nenad said, getting up on his toes to try to look into the other cubicles. "Is there anyone else here today at all?"

"One other person, but they went out to lunch."

"Oho!" Nenad said, taking a few sweeping steps towards Munroe. "Then how about we stage a forbidden office romance?" He said with a wink, gently pulling Munroe closer by his tie. Munroe snorted, but pulled the tie free from Nenad's hands and put it back in place again.

"We might be alone here right now," Munroe protested, "But it won't be for too long, and this is still my work place, I can't just—"

"Oh, come on," Nenad pouted, settling down in Munroe's lap, "Just a bit of fun won't hurt anyone."

Munroe opened his mouth to continue his protest, but it snapped shut just as quickly as Nenad's hand found its way to his crotch.

"Nenad—" Munroe started, but was silenced by a rather insistent kiss.

"Just a little bit," Nenad whispered.

Munroe knew very well that Nenad never did anything in little bits, ever, but he had yet to build up efficient defences to his advaces, seeing as he didn't even really want to in the first place. Thus, even though he knew it wasn't exactly the brightest idea he'd ever had, he gave up and allowed Nenad to gently push him back into the chair, while Nenad straddled one of his legs and stroked him a great deal more aggressively than their first time. Between that and the kisses, Munroe found himself out of breath and flustered embarrassingly quickly.

"Nenaaad—" he whined, but Nenad only kissed him again, letting go of his erection to wrap his arms around Munroe's neck, pulling himself closer against his chest. For a moment Munroe dared hope that Nenad had just been teasing him and had given up on his attempts to make Munroe come in his fucking office chair and would be content with just kissing for a while, but of course that was foolish. Nenad started grinding down against Munroe instead, and Munroe let out a low, exasperated moan. "Nenad, I rea—lly can't get these clothes messy while I'm working," he insisted, and pushed Nenad away. To his surprise, Nenad obediently slid down on the floor, leaving Munroe a moment to regain his breath.

"But it's okay as long as it doesn't get messy, right?" Nenad asked with a smile so innocent that Munroe didn't get what he was hinting at before Nenad was nuzzling his underwear.

This would be such a bad position to be caught in, he realised, but it wasn't like it wouldn't be anyway, as hard as he was, so he just nodded, and he could feel a warm huff of air as Nenad softly laughed against his leg.

It wasn't nearly as satisfying as their more intense sessions, but Nenad wasn't half bad at blow jobs either, it turned out, and as promised there was no mess left afterwards either. Munroe was reluctantly impressed.

"Well, then, my job here is done," Nenad nodded proudly, getting to his feet. Munroe made himself more presentable and collected himself before asking: "What about you?"

"Oh, well, I appreciate the offer—" Munroe hadn't really made any offer though, "—But I think our time is up, right? I'll go take care of it myself somewhere else, don't worry about me," he said in a chipper tone.

Munroe took a deep breath and exhaled. He didn't know what that meant, exactly, but Nenad was right, their time was most definitely up.

"I'll walk you out."

He needed to take some air before he got back to work.

 

Meanwhile, in another room, the mood had turned remarkably awkward as two security guards tried to figure out how to deal with the footage they'd just watched on the monitors showing the security camera feed.


End file.
